A recent issue of Psychotherapy Networker reviews 25 years of research on counseling, and concludes that the most convincing and influential work was done by Dr. John Gottman on marriage and divorce. (Dr. Gottman was also the only researcher listed in the top ten most influential therapists.)
Originally a mathematician, Gottman’s research was well designed and funded. Over 3000 couples agreed to come periodically to spend weekends in his "Love Lab" overlooking Pugent Sound in Seattle. It was a set of apartments knowingly equipped with various recording devices where couples would come spend a couple of nights, and then learn from what their recorded behavior showed.
By continuing to study these couples over 30 years, he was able to see which ones divorced, separated, stayed unhappily married, or became more and more happily married. Gottman is now able to observe a couple having an argument, and predict with "uncanny, 91% accuracy" who will and who will not get divorced. Four behaviors emerged as the primary predictors and causes of divorce. Though himself Jewish, he refers to these four toxic behaviors using a metaphor from New Testament end-times prophecy in Revelations 6, calling them "The Four Horsemen of the Marital Apocalypse." They are:
Gottman’s research shows this is the most harmful of these four mistakes. Contempt is active behavior which shows disgust for the partner, such as sarcasm, cynicism, mockery, sneering, eye-rolling, hostile humor, belligerent threats or provocations, and name-calling. These behaviors send the message, "You aren’t even worthy of my attention."
More than just a complaint which focuses on a behavior ("I hate it when you ignore me."), criticism adds insults about the person’s character or motives: "You ignore me because you don’t care, you’re lazy and stupid, you’re crazy." Complaints are necessary to solve problems, but criticism undermines problem-solving, and marriages.
When spouses raise a question or a complaint, one of the most natural ways to respond is one of the most harmful to the marriage: throwing it back in their faces. It blames the partner for questioning you, and escalates the conflict. This can be done by changing the subject, questioning the spouse’s motive, or throwing up a counter-complaint: "Well what about when YOU . . . ?" It avoids the issue and puts the spouse on the defensive.
Criticism, contempt, and defensiveness can lead to one partner just tuning the other out, putting up a stone wall. This effectively blocks all communication, and so it is a passive but very damaging expression of contempt. For many reasons in our culture, the stonewall is more likely to be put up by the husband.
The Four Dragons as I call them are four more behaviors Gottman has found can often lead to divorce. Harsh start-ups are beginning a discussion with threats or insults, rather than by raising a problem with a possible solution. Flooding is an intense flurry of hurtful behaviors, one after the other so rapidly that the spouse cannot physically or emotionally absorb or respond to one before the next one hits. Failed repair attempts are when the partner doesn’t cooperate with genuine, heartfelt efforts one makes to repair damage done. Bad memories are old wounds from the past that have not been healed, and thus bleed over into coloring a person’s view of the spouse.
It won’t work to use this list to point out partner’s mistakes, but it will help if each of you uses it to monitor and correct his or her own behavior. The research geeks over at the Love Lab say that focusing on how you behave is the best way to make your marriage a success. They have also found what positive behaviors will make a marriage really cook, and they’re presented on the back.
It is sad and silly that we can get a marriage license without knowing anything about how to be married. Here are some practical guidelines that can serve like a How-to manual for marriage. You might want to send this to a marriage you know that’s in trouble. For yourself, give you and your mate letter grades on each one, and exchange your papers.
1. We try to accept and celebrate each other, not control and correct each other.
2. We give help and praise to each other freely, out of love and faith, not guilt and fear.
3. Living for something beyond ourselves, we love our spouse as we love ourselves.
4. We do not lie to each other, or cover up what our partner needs to know.
5. In arguments, we seek first to understand, and only after we do, to be understood.
6. When we can’t agree, we seek a third opinion together.
7. We try both to earn and give trust, but we give forgiveness freely as it benefits us both.
8. When we’re wrong, we admit our mistakes, our motives for them, and we make amends.
9. We keep our love lively by mutual giving of communication, co-operation, and affection.
10. We value and support each other’s friends, family, careers, health, religion, and interests.
11. We don’t give to others time, money, or attention needed more by our marriage or children.
12. We delegate some responsibilities, but minimize double standards of rules and privileges.
13. To keep our power balanced, the strong one at the time makes the lion’s share of sacrifices.
14. Financially, we both appreciate earning, saving, sharing, enjoying life, and living simply.
15. We only have eyes for each other, so all our romantic sexual energy goes into our bedroom.
16. We apply these guidelines first and foremost to ourselves, and only then to our mates.
Last fall we mourned the passing of my mother, Betsy Hanna Schmidt (she’d insist, “Mrs. Craig Schmidt”). On what would have been her 85th birthday this month, 20 family and friends gathered to celebrate her life. I was amazed at how her life seemed to have impacted her grandchildren as much as us children. I see now that spending time with grandparents brings certain very special gifts if we look for them.
1. A new gear. If you don’t get this one, you won’t get any of the others. They talk and live at a slower pace. Get with it—it’s good for the body and soul.
2. An open ear. If nobody else wants to hear the full story of how much you’ve suffered or accomplished or been blessed, they will. And better still, they’ll believe it. If they don’t think to ask about it, tell them to sit back and listen up.
3. Stories. They tell stories, thankfully without any point. Stories entertain, teach, and digest better than the lectures others give, full of principles and advice. Theirs is too, but you don’t notice.
4. Solutions. If you don’t want advice about your problems, just ask, but if you do, just state your problem and listen. More often than with others, solutions will be given with no strings attached: they’ll love and respect you all the same if you don’t follow their advice.
5. Authority. Theirs is over your parents’, always was. It doesn’t over-rule. It’s wise enough to overlook and oversee. It’s based on vast experience. It’s like covering yourself on a cold day with a warm blanket. Don’t miss it.
6. Affirmations. Other people, especially peers and parents, tend to focus on what you don’t do well. They focus on your strengths and talents, often seeing what others cannot, and that really feels good.
7. Identity. These affirmations can give you a new view of yourself. They may give you nicknames you love. Compared to being your parents’ child, or even sometimes your lover’s lover, being their grandchild is a whole lot closer to being your own person.
8. Importance. Maybe nothing you’re doing right now is working out very well, or you feel nobody needs you. Well they do, and cheering them up with a call, a card, or best of all a visit, is a home run very time. You are always important to them.
9. Laughter. When everyone else in your life including yourself takes you and life too seriously, try your grandparent. Old people can laugh at themselves and life better than anyone else on earth, and it’s contagious.
10. Role Models. After you’ve listened to their life story enough to where you can tell it yourself, and you do, you will see they may be your best role models, especially for laughing, loving, living simply, aging, dying, relating to God, and for handling pain, loneliness, and adversity.
So remember how to visit your grandparents (or your children’s!): look for the good stuff, and that’s just what you’ll get.
Until five years ago, I never thought I’d ever create a stepfamily, but now I have. Turns out, I’m just going with the national flow. Even the staunchest defender of the traditional nuclear family, Focus on the Family, states that within two years, there will be more blended families in the US than any other form of family.
I have learned some things from reading and from doing (both right and wrong). Here are some things that help in step-parenting:
Take an interest in your stepchildren’s lives (friends, music, sports).
Be there for them - steady and supportive.
Make yourself available from a slight distance - not pushing yourself on them.
Be understanding and non-judgmental toward them.
Be patient - allowing them time to sort problems out.
Don’t try to replace or compare yourself in any way to their other parent.
Don’t shower them with too much praise or affection at first.
Don’t demand a lot of attention.
Don’t do anything that makes you need or expect appreciation or response.
When you are talked to in a mildly disrespectful way, ignore it and just discontinue the conversation.
Whenever a stepchild addresses you in a very disrespectful way by attacking your character, say calmly that you love them, but you also love yourself and you will not participate in conversations like this. Withdraw immediately, remaining quiet and peaceful, and let your spouse know about it when you get together.
A good parent and spouse will broker the relationship, getting both of you present and asking both what was said, and where the stories of what happened are different, calling no one a liar. Your spouse needs to invite and encourage both the child and you the stepparent to rephrase statements so both can show respect for each other.
In relating to stepchildren, it is helpful to avoid some common assumptions that turn out to be MYTHS:
Depends on the child—some absolutely yes, some absolutely not, and some absolutely unpredictable. Don’t take it personally, or it will be worse. That’s just how they are. Like an elementary school teacher starting up a class in August or September, it’s better to start out more reserved and matter-of-fact. Let them see that your greater warmth will come out in response to theirs, and to the respect they show you with their loyalty and obedience.
The marital affection you receive in front of them needs to be reserved, and the affection you give needs to be VERY limited. It takes a long time, if ever, before they will be comfortable seeing or hearing about the affection you naturally show each other.
It will take more time (years) and effort (from both of you) for them to let you into their hearts, especially if (a) the divorce wasn’t fairly and adequately explained to them, (b) your remarriage was fairly quick, (c) you are suspected of dating each other or being friends before or during the divorce process, (d) the other parent isn’t yet remarried and happily so, and (e) your spouse isn’t very loyal or assertive in power struggles between you and others for their support.
Actually teenagers are often the hardest to reach and to know. Probing questions may be taken personally, and so they would come best when you and your spouse are both present, and agree for one of you to say, "We were wondering. . ."
In our own blended family, I have approached building relationships with my stepchildren as a life-long adventure. Without extending myself any less than before to my own children, I offer as much of myself personally to my new (step) children, though they don’t usually need or take as much. Treating them as a wonderful add-on feature of my life, just as important as my own children, when on occasion I find them treating each other the same way, I am pleased and amazed.
All parents from time to time find themselves locked into an ongoing power struggle with a child. The parent’s natural instinct response to a child’s misbehavior is met with more and more of that behavior. My suggestions here will require parents to go against their instincts.
Many of the ideas below can be found in two excellent programs for parents. One is Systematic Training for Effective Parenting (STEP), at www.lifematters.com. The other is Parent Effectiveness Training, begun nearly 40 years ago by then Western Kentucky University professor and later Nobel Peace Prize nominee Thomas Gordon (see www.gordontraining.com).
1. Figure out what the child is trying to do. It may take asking, or else trial-and-error learning to determine which games the child might be playing. They play games like Do my work, Show me you care, Take my tension, Pay attention to me, Feel my pain, and You can’t make me.
2. Figure out what you can’t stand, and learn to stand it. Perhaps you can’t tolerate the feeling that you’re not in control, that you’re a failure as a parent, that your child doesn’t love or like you, that you’re acting like your own parent did, or that there’s screaming or danger of violence in the house. Whatever you can’t stand, the child knows it, and will give you that feeling to get you to cave into the child’s demands in return for the child’s stopping the behavior you can’t stand.
3. Redefine your terms. Take the focus off what you can’t change (the child) and onto what you can (yourself). Refocus on being in control of yourself, not failing to change your ways, loving yourself, etc.
4. Learn to time yourself out, and soothe yourself. Take deep breaths, pray, call a friend. If appropriate, wait for the child to re-engage you. Be sure you’ve calmed yourself down before responding.
5. Avoid rewarding children for passivity, dishonesty, disrespect, or dangerous behavior. Don’t cave to their demands when they’re misbehaving.
6. Give them natural consequences for misbehavior. If their selfish demands would provoke rejection outside the home, give it them. "People won’t trust (like, include, admire, cooperate with, want to be around) you when you act that way with them, and neither do I." Parents must teach and act out how misbehavior will be responded to in the real world of school, job, love, marriage, friendships, or college roommates. So the consequences are things like loss of privilege, loss of help, end of dialog, time out, or withdrawal of attention.
7. Offer to let children win their game if they let you win yours too. Give them attention help, sympathy and trust if they give you respect, honesty, self-control and cooperation. If they refuse, just tell them you guess they don’t want what they were demanding as bad as they said they did. Tell them their actions speak louder than their words. Tell them you’ll follow their lead. You’ll cooperate when they cooperate.
8. Realize the wisdom in these proverbs I’ve heard: "You can’t change anyone but yourself." "You aren’t giving up control, just the illusion of control." "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results." "Children respond better to encouragement than criticism." "You choose the lessons you teach, and let the child choose how and when to learn them."
Just remember, in a power struggle, parents who get upset enough to cave in are not saying to the child, "You win" or "I love you", but "You don’t have to change, I will. This isn’t your problem, it’s mine."
If you’ve ever wondered why so many people spoil their children, it’s simple. They get two big pay-offs. First, the obvious: it’s easier just to get through the moment by indulging children’s demands, rather than stopping to teach them a lesson. And the more subtle reason is that by living for and through the child, they can avoid all their own feelings, issues and responsibilities. It’s like a drug—a pain-killing escape from reality.
The reasons not to spoil a child are that you do get to live your own life. They won’t wear you out, embarrass you, or empty your wallet. And when they get older, they won’t be as quick to turn their backs on you like they have no idea who you are.
It is very satisfying to raise children who have the basic self-confidence to believe that their needs will be met, not necessarily on demand, but always on time, not necessarily by others, but because they’re also learning how to get things done themselves.
Raising unspoiled children requires that you don’t meet their wants or especially their demands when these differ from what you know deep inside that they need. Making them wait fairly often for what they want teaches them patience, and allows them to use their imagination and self-care skills to see how they can more independently meet their own needs.
As they see you sometimes taking care of your own needs ahead of their demands, you are modeling for them how effective caretakers must take care of themselves too.
So how can you tell yourself and your children the difference between what they need and what they demand? They often want or even whine for things they don’t really need, because they don’t know what they need. They need you to teach them what they need, such as:
They need to know their needs will be met eventually if they wait and ask politely.
The demand of the spoiled: I will get others to meet my needs.
They need to know that they are loved, that they can give love and receive love.
The demand of the spoiled: I will charm others into showing love to me.
They need to know they can comfort or entertain themselves when they are lonely, sad or bored.
The demand of the spoiled: I can always find ways to avoid being left alone.
They need to learn to enjoy hard work, finishing a task, and doing it well.
The demand of the spoiled: I am charming and clever enough to get others to do my work for me.
They need to express anger at selfish mistakes, forgiving themselves and others for such mistakes without holding a grudge.
The demand of the spoiled: If you don’t do things my way, my temper will make you wish you had.
They need to trust themselves not to freeze when they’re afraid, but to act smart.
The demand of the spoiled: I will dramatize my fear until you have done whatever it takes to relieve me of it.
They need to give a brief smile or hello with eye contact when they first see a friend or family member.
The demand of the spoiled: I am special, so I don’t look at or speak to people until they have broken the ice first.
They need to trust that they will be praised and rewarded eventually for doing good, criticized and punished eventually for doing bad.
The demand of the spoiled: I am praised because I am specially gifted. I will make anyone feel guilty for criticizing or punishing me.
They need to avoid lying, realizing they don’t always need to tell the entire truth.
The demand of the spoiled: I give whatever version of the truth it pays me to give, but I’ll never admit that.
They need to apologize and discipline themselves when they’ve messed up.
The demand of the spoiled: If I’m in trouble, I will never apologize. My family and friends will bail me out, because if I ain’t happy, ain’t nobody going to be happy.
They need to know they can make friends easily, because they enjoy being a good, loyal friend.
The demand of the spoiled: I’ll treat you like a friend when I feel like it, depending upon what you’ve done for me lately.
They need to know that they are being prepared to leave home someday and live their own lives.
The demand of the spoiled: I will leave home (and come back) whenever I feel like it, for a bigger stage and a better audience.
When you’re tempted to indulge your children, just remember, you’re not giving in to them, you’re selling them out, down the river to a sick society. You’re spoiling their lives, and not just theirs, but yours, and everybody else’s they’ll spoil. So Buck Up, Campers. Let’s put our grown-up pants on.
A high percentage of animals raise up responsible offspring. Their young leave the nest and learn to successfully fend for themselves. What percentage of American parents do you think get those two jobs done?
My definition of successful children is growing up to solve their own problems emotionally and financially. They live contentedly on what they make, and they get along with those they live with. This usually requires at least one parent who has done the same, and I doubt that that any more than one fifth of American parents would qualify.
To me, the rest aren’t well motivated or equipped to raise responsible children. Nevertheless, if you have the wisdom and courage to ride out your kids’ protests in order to give them a chance at a successful life later on, here’s how.
In short, children grow up to be responsible when parents do three things: 1. Clarify which activities are privileges. 2. Encourage ways of earning the trust required for these privileges. 3. Withhold access to privileges until the trust has been earned.
To elaborate, children will expect and feel entitled to enjoy doing many things which are not necessary for their growth and well-being. Ways to earn the parent’s trust must be spelled out for the child: "you can go once you have finished doing your homework." Show that you want to give the trust, that you hate to have to restrict the child, but that worse still would be spoiling them into thinking privileges in life will come from whining, demanding and saying, "Everybody else is doing it."
Remember that being responsible means being content with what you’ve earned, and getting along with everyone involved. Here is a starter list for some privileges many kids mistakenly feel entitled to: having something given to or bought for them, being taken at their word, going to the mall, watching TV or movies, talking on the phone, being on line, being taken somewhere they want to go, choosing what to wear or where to eat, driving the family car, having a paying job outside the home, and spending the money they have earned and saved.
The level of trust required for an activity depends on factors such as these: where, when, with whom, for how long, at what age, in privacy vs. with supervision, and the character content of what is experienced. For example, all of these would be factors to consider for allowing a child to watch a given movie.
Certain behaviors are avoided by children when they are being selfish and rebellious. At these times, they are showing their attitude is not appropriate for being trusted to act responsibly. Children earn trust by dong things like this. . . .
Greeting family members hello and goodbye, checking in by phone while out, coming home on time, spontaneously and honestly confessing misbehaviors, and taking responsibility for them (offering to earn back the trust that was broken). Doing things together as a family also earns trust, such as having fun, eating, working, and worshipping together in peace.
Doing chores demonstrates appreciation that if you work first and play later, both activities work out better in the long run. Specify the age-appropriate chores involved in keeping each of the following areas cleaned and picked up: kitchen (food), bedroom (clothes), family room, and the yard. What’s appropriate for a given age? Whatever shows that progress is being made on schedule with learning to do almost everything to take care of oneself by age 18 or 19.
Certain activities are givens. The following should not be skipped by a child or withheld by a parent, because they are necessary for health and well-being: three nutritious meals a day, eight hours for sleep, going to school, doing one’s homework, exercise, access to worship and solitude, and time with family and friends known to be healthy and loyal to the immediate family.
Other activities are almost always beneficial, and can be considered nearly givens: time with scouts, sports, at church, and at school-sponsored extracurricular activities. These should not usually be withheld for long periods of time.
In addition to a child’s neglecting the responsibilities listed above, the following trust-busters are among behaviors that should always result in widespread and lengthy loss of privileges: lying, stealing, intentionally destroying property, chronically wasting resources, anything legally defined as physical, emotional or sexual abuse, or jeopardizing health by smoking, drugging, underage drinking, driving while intoxicated, or risking pregnancy or sexually transmitted disease.
If you’re a parent still confused over why your children aren’t learning to be responsible, chances are you are providing as entitlements many privileges that they should have to earn. You’re probably buying them too much, supervising them too little, and over-exposing them to pornography and violence in music, movies, games, computers and TV. But of all the parental foolishness I see, by far the most ridiculous (and the most commonly seen in public) is indulging a child’s tantrums—it’s yielding to emotional extortion, and giving instant gratification for their children’s most selfish, impatient and rude behavior.
In closing, parents, remember: GARBAGE IN, GARBAGE OUT. They reap what you sow, and so do you. Surely you can raise your parenting skills a notch, and raise your children to be as responsible when they leave the nest as wild animals are.